reckless
by downn-in-flames
Summary: Lily Evans' soulmate is an idiot. Although, she's never actually met him to confirm this. {a soulmate!AU tale of rugby matches, incompetent medical interns, and a broken rib or two}
1. a first encounter

Lily Evans' soulmate is a complete idiot.

She's never met him to confirm this, but she does know that he's stupid enough to _keep getting himself hurt._

"Fuck," she hisses, dropping her clipboard and clutching at the phantom pain spreading across her ribcage.

"What'd your soulmate do this time?" Marlene laughs, picking up Lily's clipboard from the floor and handing it to her friend.

"Good bloody question," Lily gasps, but she's gradually becoming more accustomed to the pain, now that the initial shock has passed.

The sheer number of times that her soulmate has managed to injure himself has caused Lily to develop an impressive pain tolerance out of necessity. "Maybe a broken rib or two?" she muses.

Marlene laughs. "God, am I happy my soulmate works a desk job. Really, Lils, I can't wait to find out what this bloke does all the time."

Marlene really is incredibly lucky, Lily thinks to herself, as she slowly makes her way to an open chair in the break room. Marlene met Dorcas just a few months after her soulmate procedure, while sitting in Society Café revising for a biology tutorial. The two immediately connected.

If she thinks about it, Marlene and Dorcas' relationship is really one of the only reasons she still believes in this whole soulmate nonsense to begin with. Perhaps that's just Lily being bitter, but she's almost prepared to give up on the whole thing. After seven years, she really feels like she would've already met this 'soulmate' of hers, if it were truly meant to be.

And after all, Petunia declined the procedure, and she seems perfectly happy with Vernon. Even if they're not 'genetically calculated matches.'

On days like today, when her dumbarse of a soulmate managed to get himself injured yet again, Lily can't help but wish she'd declined the procedure as well.

"Hi Doctor Evans!" An eager medical intern pops into her line of sight.

"Hello, Daniel," Lily replies cordially. "How can I help you?"

The dark-haired boy grins. "Slughorn assigned me to you for the week, remember? And you've got a patient in A220."

Lily almost admires Daniel Abbott's eagerness. She definitely wasn't anywhere near that excited during her internship – the 20-hour shifts and constant criticism from senior doctors have a tendency to wear on one's patience.

The boy does, however, have a number of faults. He tends to make rash diagnoses, without thinking through the alternatives, and he could stand to be a little gentler when handling patients. Which is likely why he's been assigned to Lily for the week, anyways; Slughorn, the department head, has always favoured Lily's calculating and detailed nature.

"Alright then," she finally sighs. "Let's go."

On days like today, Lily wishes she'd chosen a department other than A&E. The fast-paced and constantly moving environment of emergency medicine was what drew her to it initially. While she still loves that rapid tempo and accompanying adrenaline rush of a busy shift, there are times like today where she'd love something slower, like general practise, particularly when her side is still throbbing.

Outside the door to room A220, Lily turns back to look at Daniel. "I'm going to let you take the lead on this patient," she tells him. "So you're going to be doing most of the interacting with the patient, and I'll be supervising."

"You got it, Doctor Evans!"

Lily feels immensely grateful for the existence of interns – the scenario she's just laid out for Daniel makes it sound like she's trying to give him more experience, but in reality, her primary motivation is that she could really use a break. Making her intern do the bulk of the work on this particular patient is an incredibly sly way to achieve that.

She grabs the file hanging on the door and walks into the room, immediately noting the man sitting on the examination table. He's got quite a bit of dirt caked to one side of his body – the mud has even managed to work its way into the mess of dark hair on top of his head.

He's dressed in what appears to be a rugby uniform, and – Lily immediately wants to smack herself for even _thinking_ this – he looks incredibly fit.

"Hello, Mister…" she quickly checks the folder she's holding, "Potter. I'm Doctor Evans and this is Doctor Abbott, my assistant. He'll be examining you today."

The man on the table – James Potter, as it would appear – looks up at her with an expression of interest.

"I'd really prefer if you'd examine me instead."

Ugh, he's one of _those_ , Lily thinks to herself. There's something about the words 'assistant' and 'intern' that make people automatically doubt the capabilities of the doctor in question. Even though they've already gotten a medical degree, and are therefore perfectly capable of examining a patient on their own.

Although, to be fair, Daniel does have a few weaknesses.

"I can assure you that Doctor Abbott is fully capable of performing his duties, and I'll be here supervising the entire time."

"I don't doubt Doctor Abbott's competence, Evans," James replies. "I just happen to have a thing for pretty redhead doctors."

He makes no effort to hide the up-and-down glance he gives Lily – although what he's looking at is a mystery to her, scrubs aren't exactly figure-flattering – and looks back up at her with a smirk on his face.

Lily has to take a deep breath to resist physically attacking this patient. Where on earth does he get off on being so forward?

She restrains herself, passing the file in her hand to a slightly-stunned Daniel.

"Doctor Abbott will be treating you. It's vital to his training."

She glares at her patient, daring him to challenge her. She can take on a rather intimidating nature when she wants to – something that earned her a bit of a nasty nickname among the previous class of interns.

"Er, right," Daniel says awkwardly, walking over to James. "So you're actually James Potter – star player for the Wasps?"

"One and the same. Although not really a star player at this point, given that I'm assuming I'll be out for a few games with this." He gestures vaguely to the side of him that's covered in mud, clearly trying not to move too much.

Daniel opens up the file – he should've started with that instead of the mildly star-struck reaction he initially went with, Lily notes.

"It says here that you suspect you've broken a rib?"

"Correct. Took a rather nasty hit towards the end of the match, and coach wouldn't let me stay in unless I promised to come straight here afterwards."

"You finished a match with a suspected broken rib?"

Daniel asks that question with a slight tone of wonderment, like he's impressed that this idiot of a man would continue to play with an injury. Lily, on the other hand, thinks it's absolutely foolish that he wouldn't get medical attention right away and would instead choose to risk making it worse by finishing out the game.

"Yeah," James replies, making it sound as if the alternative would be unthinkable.

"Alright, well let's check that out, shall we?" Daniel answers. "I'll need you to pull your shirt up so I can get a better look at the injured area."

"See, this is why I wanted Evans over there as my doctor." Lily's head snaps up at his words, so he addresses her directly. "I would've loved to hear you ask me to take my shirt off, love."

"Doctor Evans," Lily corrects.

James smirks at her again, before grabbing his shirt and pulling it off in one smooth motion. Lily, on the other hand, gasps in pain from the sudden electric sensation down her side.

The rugby player clearly interprets this as a gasp aimed at him. "Like what you see?"

Lily briefly glances at James, once the rush of pain has subsided slightly. If it weren't for the constant stream of suggestive comments coming out of his mouth, she'd have to admit that he does, in fact, have a very nice body.

"You wish." Lily is aware that she's definitely not behaving professionally right now, but when her patient is being such a _git_ , she really can't help it.

She's also distinctly aware that the patient in front of her is experiencing the exact injury that she'd previously theorized her soulmate to be experiencing, but she doesn't want to believe the two instances could be connected. Surely, this infuriating, arrogant athlete isn't her _soulmate_.

If he is, that means that the genetic matching system must be much more flawed than it purports to be. This bloke – this _James Potter_ – is the polar opposite of everything she's ever looked for in a mate.

She really should be paying more attention to Daniel, but she just can't find the energy to right now. Instead, she studies the posters hung on the walls of the examination room – a mismatched mess of motivational quotes about persistence and dedication.

Her distraction is rewarded with a shock of pain shooting across her ribcage, and she hears James suck in a breath through clenched teeth, before muttering, "Ow."

"Abbott!" Lily barks, white-hot spots flashing across her vision. "What have I told you about being more gentle with patients?"

"Right, sorry Doctor Evans," the intern answers meekly.

James looks over at Lily, connecting the dots in his head. Lily finds that the room suddenly feels much smaller, the temperature warmer, the air stiffer. The budding tension could be cut with a knife.

"Felt that too, did you, Evans?"

And the moment is gone. Lily is transported back into reality, into the fact that she's currently facing an extremely annoying patient who also appears to be her genetically-matched _soulmate_.

"Perhaps," she responds, through gritted teeth.

James breaks into a bright smile – an expression that Lily finds suits him better than his arrogant smirk. "Soulmates, huh?"

"The science behind it is questionable at best."

If this man, who has been nothing but overtly flirtatious and frustrating from the moment she entered the room, is supposed to be the person that her genes suggest she'll be most compatible with, then the science must be worse than just _questionable_.

Lily ignores the fact that it's been proven correct at about a 98% rate.

"Doctor Abbott, please order an X-ray. Assuming it's a minor fracture, no further testing needs to be done."

Lily snaps back into doctor mode, back into the place she feels safest.

"The X-ray technician will be in to get you shortly," she addresses James.

"I'll miss you," he calls out in response, and Lily takes that as her cue to leave the room.

She hurries down the hall, away from her obnoxious (but admittedly rather attractive) soulmate, and to the next patient who requires her attention – a 12-year-old boy whose mum suspects that he accidentally consumed laundry detergent.

It's a busy afternoon, so Lily almost forgets about the annoying rugby player for a little bit. Until she has to go discharge him, that is.

When she walks back into the room, Daniel in tow – because she wasn't about to face him on her own – James instantly reaches up to ruffle his hair in a way that she's sure he thinks is supposed to be attractive.

"Just couldn't get enough of me, eh?"

She rolls her eyes. She's determined to not lose her professional demeanor this time around.

"I just need you to sign these discharge papers for me," she explains, handing him the clipboard she's been holding.

"Anything for you, love," he replies, taking it from her and scanning the page.

"You'll need to allow six weeks for those two broken ribs to fully heal. There's a prescription for painkillers waiting for you at the chemist's – take those every so often for the first few weeks or so, until the pain subsides."

He looks up at her. "Fancy going on a date with me, Evans? We are soulmates, after all."

"I'm your doctor, Mr. Potter, and you're my patient. That crosses professional boundaries," Lily reasons.

James scribbles across the bottom of the page, before thrusting the clipboard back at her. "Not anymore, I'm not. Now you have no reason to not go out on a date with me tonight."

"I have a number of reasons, actually. You're arrogant, reckless, and I don't think you've said a single word to me today that wasn't some form of a suggestive comment," Lily seethes. As James so helpfully pointed out, he's technically no longer her patient anymore, so she's letting the rules of professionalism slide a little. "So forgive me if I'd rather go on a date with the Loch Ness Monster than you."

James' smirk falters for a moment, and it strikes Lily that he looks almost… upset?

It's the first flash of emotion she's seen on him that wasn't dripping in arrogance.

James recovers quick enough though. "It's okay, Evans, you'll succumb to my charm eventually. Give me a ring when that happens."

Lily's puzzled by that. "I don't have your – "

"You do now." James taps on the clipboard that she's holding, and sure enough, he's written his phone number next to his signature on the discharge papers.

He gingerly lowers himself off the examination table and heads for the door, leaving Lily standing there and watching him go.

God, the man has a nice arse.

Lily is entirely unsure what comes over her – if it's delirium from lack of sleep, or the fact that it's been ages since she's flirted with a guy, or something else entirely – but she finds herself calling after him before he leaves the room.

"Potter?"

James turns back to look at her, his hand hovering on the door handle.

"Don't forget to take that pain medication – I'll know it if you don't." She mimics his arrogant smirk right back at him, before leaving the room through the staff exit.

Daniel follows after her – Lily had completely forgotten that she had an audience until this point. She rounds on him as soon as the door shuts behind him.

"Don't you dare repeat a word of any of that to _anyone_ ," she warns him, before heading down the hallway.

It's the second person she's left completely gobsmacked in the past minute.


	2. a second chance

"Marlene, he's completely awful," Lily complains, pouring herself and her guest a glass of red wine each.

"And you're positive you're not overreacting?" her friend asks from the couch.

"I don't think he said a single word to me that wasn't a suggestive comment." Lily brings the glasses over, passing one to Marlene. "And he wouldn't stop calling me Evans!"

"Well, that is your name," Marlene points out.

"I'm _Doctor_ Evans at work, not just _Evans_. I didn't drag myself through Oxford Medical School and an internship from hell just to get referred to by just my surname."

"So the bloke finds you attractive and called you by a nickname. I don't see what's so bad about that." Marlene takes a sip of her wine. "Plus, I Googled him, and Lily, I am not attracted to men in the slightest, but even I can see that he is fit as hell."

"Maybe he is, but he has a shit personality," Lily responds.

"Is he really that awful, or are you only picking out the worst things about him?"

Lily considers that for a moment. Marlene is, perhaps, being a bit more logical about this situation than she is. "Well, I've only just met him – so I don't even know if he has any redeeming qualities. If he does, he sure as hell didn't show them. I spent the entire time trying to maintain at least a _semblance_ of professionalism, but he was just so damn infuriating."

Marlene cocks her head, giving Lily a judging look. "So you mean to tell me that you had a flirtatious and fit-as-hell rugby player under your care today and you didn't flirt back _once_?"

Lily's cheeks color slightly as she remembers her final comment. "No, I didn't."

Marlene breaks into a wide smile, her face lighting up at her friend's blush. "Lily Evans, you dirty minx, you're lying to me! You did flirt with him!"

"Just once, and only a little bit, as I was leaving," Lily defends herself. "And what does it matter anyways? In all likelihood, I'm never going to see him again. And he has no way of getting in touch with me."

Lily chooses not to mention the fact that she now has his number saved in her phone.

She tells herself that it's strictly for medical concerns; after all, if he doesn't allow for the proper recovery time, it's going to cause Lily a whole lot of pain as well.

"Why won't you see him again?" Marlene asks.

"Because he doesn't live in London," Lily explains. "He was here for a match, but the Wasps are based in Coventry – I looked it up."

"If it's meant to be, it'll happen. He _is_ your soulmate, after all."

Lily snorts. "At least now I know why he's been getting himself hurt so much over the years. I was starting to worry that he was just extraordinarily clumsy."

"Rugby player certainly wouldn't have been my first guess," Marlene replies.

"Right?" Lily replies, a bit more enthusiastic about the conversation now that it's not just Marlene trying to convince her to give James a shot. "I was thinking my match would be another doctor, or a barrister, or something like that – not someone who gets injured for fun and probably only has like ten brain cells left."

"Well, you know what they say, opposites attract. Also, you've only just met the bloke, so how do you know he's not some sort of genius in disguise?"

"If he was a genius, I can't help but imagine he'd be doing something more… respectable with his life."

Lily is aware that she's being a bit judgmental – not to mention that a world-class rugby player is eons better than, say, a drill salesman, like Petunia's husband.

"And don't give me that 'opposites attract' lark when you and Dorcas are so alike that you basically complete each other's sentences," she adds as an after-thought.

"No two soulmate pairings are exactly alike, Lily," Marlene reasons, and Lily briefly hates how logical her friend is being about all of this. She just wants someone to commiserate with her about how _annoying_ this soulmate situation is for her, dammit.

"I know that," Lily finally relents, "I just didn't expect mine to be quite like this, you know?"

Marlene pats her friend's shoulder reassuringly. "I know, dear. Just give it time, yeah? Who knows, it could work out better than you expect."

Marlene leaves her with those parting words, heading down the hallway to her own flat.

Once Lily's alone, she pours herself another glass of wine – probably not the best idea since she has to be at work at 7:00 tomorrow – and pulls out her laptop.

She finds herself Googling the science behind soulmate genetics. While the real world may be messy and complicated, Lily has always felt at home in the world of academic literature, where things are much more black and white.

It takes her only a few moments to find the very first article on the procedure, published about nine years ago. Lily was sixteen when the soulmate system finished its final round of clinical trials and was opened to the public – she remembers poring over this paper obsessively when it first came out, and she's read it a number of times since then as well.

Essentially, scientists had discovered a sequence of genes about 20 years that determined compatibility with another person – these sequences are completely unique, save for one other person. That person, with that same sequence of genes, is supposed to be your soulmate.

And of course, there are flaws to the argument, because it completely ignores how much of a person is determined by things outside of their genetic makeup. But regardless, it's generally correct at predicting soulmate matches.

The 'soulmate procedure,' as it's now commonly referred to, uses that gene sequence to link the two soulmates together. It essentially links people together by their nerve endings, allowing them to feel each other's pain – this procedure, the scientists claimed, would increase empathy for one's soulmate, therefore resulting in a stronger and more intimate connection once the two soulmates actually connect.

The procedure has always been entirely discretionary – forcing people to go through the procedure would be a bit too akin to the dystopian fantasy novels Lily read as a child.

So there have always been people like Lily's sister Petunia, who scoff at the science of soulmates and opt out of the procedure. It's not as if refusing the procedure denies the person any chance of finding love; Petunia and Vernon have been happily married since they were twenty.

But because Lily is filled with a sense of morbid curiosity, she finds herself Googling "failed soulmate matches."

There are over a million results.

The stories range from the mundane to the macabre. There's a ton of poorly-written, rambling blog posts about people finding their 'soulmate,' only to discover that they're nothing remotely close to twin souls. And then there's the stories of soulmates going rogue – becoming so disappointed with their genetically-determined match that they come unhinged and murder their unsuspecting partner.

At the very least, Lily feels relatively confident that James Potter isn't going to kill her. At least, not in that way.

* * *

It's just over six weeks from that day when Lily's daily tube ride is interrupted by a searing pain in her shoulder.

At first, she thinks it might've been a really aggressive shoulder check from a fellow passenger, but then she notes that they're all a bit too packed in for anyone to hit her quite that hard.

She immediately pulls out her mobile, scrolling through her contacts to find the one she's looking for.

 _17:42_

 _What the FUCK did you do this time?_

The screen instantly displays a message send error, and Lily curses herself for being so naïve as to forget that she has absolutely zero service on the Underground.

She gingerly shrugs her shoulder, trying to alleviate the pain even though she knows it's pointless. It's a strange sensation that she's never quite grown accustomed to – the fact that she can feel the pain like it's her own but it doesn't mitigate or worsen based on her own movements.

It's not until she gets off the tube and is walking up on the street that she feels her mobile buzz in her pocket once, twice, three times.

 ** _18:02_**

 ** _evans?_**

 ** _is that you?_**

 ** _i knew you couldn't resist me forever ;)_**

She's abandoning her hard-and-fast rule of never texting while walking through the busy streets of London, pulling the gloves off her hands to type her response.

 _18:04_

 _Don't flatter yourself, Potter._

 _Just please tell me why it feels like my shoulder's about to fall off._

 ** _18:07_**

 ** _today was the first day i was cleared for practice – i got a little overexcited_**

 _18:08_

 _Of course you did._

 ** _18:11_**

 ** _sorry, evans. i'm icing it now, if that'll help_**

 ** _plus there's no actual damage this time – just a bruise_**

 _18:12_

 _Thank God._

Lily slides her phone back into her pocket. Her fingers have gone numb at this point, and she fumbles for longer than usual to get her keys out of her bag.

Once inside the comforting warmth of her apartment, Lily makes short work of changing from her scrubs into an oversized Oxford sweatshirt and pyjama pants.

Her phone buzzes again, and she pulls it out of her recently discarded scrub pants.

 ** _18:23_**

 ** _so, apart from the shoulder thing, how was your day?_**

 ** _any other dashing rugby players come into a &e recently?_**

 _18:26_

 _It was… good. Busy._

 _And definitely no dashing rugby players._

 _We haven't had one of those since… 10 weeks ago maybe?_

Lily smirks to herself. As much as she hates to admit it, she's getting a bit of a rush from teasing James like this.

She does begrudge him for his apparent aversion to using periods and capital letters, though. But she's always been the odd person out who insists on properly capitalization and punctuation in text messages.

And maybe it's because she's in the comfort of her flat, reheating leftover Chinese takeaway and flipping through channels on the telly, but she finds that James' arrogance isn't quite as grating as it was last time.

 ** _18:28_**

 ** _you wound me, evans_**

 _18:29_

 _Don't call me Evans._

 ** _18:33_**

 ** _well then what am i supposed to call you, love?_**

 ** _you're not my doctor anymore, and i don't know your first name_**

 _18:34_

 _It's Lily._

 ** _18:36_**

 ** _lily potter has a nice ring to it_**

 _18:38_

 _This conversation is over._

 ** _18:40_**

 ** _shit, that was too far_**

 ** _sorry evans_**

 ** _wait i mean lily_**

 ** _fcuk_**

Lily can't help but audibly laugh at James' panicked backtracking. She'll answer him – in the morning. She has to make him stew in his stupidity for a little bit.

She does actually reply to him the next day, and the day after that, and the day after that. She finds that texting him isn't actually quite as infuriating as interacting with him in person. Apparently, typing words out on a keyboard grants him a filter that he doesn't quite seem to have in person.

James does attempt to ask her on a date a few more times, to which Lily responds by coming up with all manner of creative ways to turn him down. "You'll have to hop in line behind all the other rugby players I've fixed up in A&E" and "sorry, I only date boys who _didn't_ break their nose in the middle of my BMAT" are just two of her favourites.

Marlene and Dorcas both take the mickey out of her when they realize she's been texting the soulmate she claimed to despise so much. Dorcas tries to convince Lily to let the poor bloke take her out on a date, but Lily doesn't budge. She claims she likes him much better over the phone than in person. And plus, he lives in Coventry.

She won't admit it to anyone, but she's also terrified that James only sees her as a game – a prize to be won. That's certainly how she felt on the first day she met him, like he was just trying to wind her up and push her buttons for the fun of it.

She wants to believe in the science of soulmates, in that 98% success rate. But her and James come from different worlds – how could they ever really be destined for each other? They're too different.

He's arrogant and brash and reckless, and she's cautious and detailed and logical. By all rational measures, they're totally wrong for each other.

She's walking through Tesco, in the middle of a text berating him for his biscuit preferences, that she almost hits another shopper with her trolley.

The man looks up at her, affronted, and then a look of recognition passes across his face. "Lily? Is that you?"

Lily stuffs her phone into the back pocket of her jeans. "Remus! It's so good to see you. It's been – what, three years now?"

"We graduated four years ago, if my memory serves me correctly." The sandy-haired boy – a friend from uni – smiles at her. "How have you been?"

"I've been great," Lily replies, returning the smile. "I'm in the A&E department at Saint Bartholomew's. And how's your… you're doing international human rights law, right?"

"I am, and it's great. I'm working with a non-governmental organization right now that's advocating for refugee rights, and it's just… _really good_ to be making a difference, you know?"

Lily nods. She understands the feeling. It's part of the reason she went into medicine anyways – that opportunity to make a difference in people's lives.

"And how's Sirius?"

Sirius Black is Remus' soulmate – they'd been friends since grammar school, but had danced around the idea of actually _dating_ for years. Then they'd both gotten the soulmate procedure, and Sirius had immediately stabbed himself with a pen the moment the two of them were reunited. When Remus let out a yelp of pain as well, that was all the encouragement either of the two needed.

"He's good too," Remus responds. "Although we haven't gotten to spend much time together lately – we've got a friend from secondary school who's staying with us until he finds his own place, and he's always around whenever he's not at rugby practice."

"Rugby practice?"

Remus lets out a bark of laughter. "Oh yeah, one of Sirius and I's best mates from secondary is a world-class rugby player. Almost a celebrity, really. He plays for the Wasps, and they're currently moving back to their original stadium in London, which means he's crashing with us for the time being."

Lily can't believe the coincidence. But surely Remus' childhood friend isn't the same Wasps player. "What's your rugby player friend's name, by chance?"

"James Potter."

Lily very attractively chokes on her own saliva. As she's coughing and attempting to catch her breath, Remus chuckles.

"I take it you've heard of him?"

Lily can only nod.

"I didn't know you followed sports," Remus adds.

"I don't," Lily explains, as soon as she's able to speak again. "He, er, well, I was the doctor assigned to him when he broke two ribs a couple months ago."

Remus stares at her for a moment, eyes going wide. "Christ, when James said his soulmate was a fit red-haired A&E doctor, he… meant you?"

Lily bites her lip. "Yeah."

"I really should've put that one together," Remus replies, grinning to himself. "I've had to listen to him talk about you non-stop since he moved in."

Lily's a bit surprised. "You have?"

"Oh my God, yes. He's never referred to you by name, but I swear if I have to hear him rave about 'that funny thing his soulmate texted him earlier today' or mope about 'his soulmate turning him down again' one more time, I'm going to smother him with my couch cushions."

Lily flushes. She hadn't really expected James to genuinely be upset about her rejecting him.

"If you don't mind me asking, though," Remus continues, "why exactly do you keep rejecting him anyways?"

Remus' directness catches Lily off guard, and it takes her a few moments to form a response. "He's perfectly fine over text," Lily finally manages, "but in person, he was a complete arse."

To Lily's surprise, Remus actually laughs at that. "That doesn't surprise me at all. James is absolutely shit with girls – you'd really think as a famous athlete he'd be better, but nope, he's just as bad as he was in grammar school. He basically panics and says the first, and often the most inappropriate, thing that comes to mind."

Remus' words have Lily completely reconsidering her first impressions of the bloke. What she'd originally interpreted as James intentionally aggravating her and coming on way too strong was, if Remus is to be believed, just his nerves getting the best of him and causing him to massively overcompensate.

"Hm, and here I was just thinking that was his personality," Lily muses.

"Oh, don't get me wrong," Remus responds, "he's still got a bit of an overinflated ego. But he's a good guy. Give him a chance. Maybe then he'll start staying at your flat and give Sirius and I some damn alone time for once."

Lily can't suppress a smile. "I'll think about it."

Remus smiles back. "Good. See you around, Lily."

"Bye, Remus."

As soon as Remus turns to go down the next aisle, Lily fires off a quick text to James.

 _14:57_

 _You're mental if you think Jammie Dodgers are anywhere near the best biscuit of all time._

* * *

 **A/N: Yes, for those of you who asked, this isn't just a one-shot! It's actually going to end up being four parts. Also, even though this is technically a James/Lily-centric piece, my favorite moment in this entire story is just picturing Sirius stoically stabbing himself with a pen and watching Remus yelp in pain.**


	3. a third stop

Classically, the moment that Lily decides that she'll say 'yes' the next times James asks her out, he doesn't ask her on a date for the next two weeks. When he finally does, it's in the middle of a discussion about the best types of red wine, of all things. Lily is partial to merlot, and James is insisting that a good Malbec is life-changing.

 ** _20:04_**

 ** _there's a restaurant by my new flat that has the best selection_**

 ** _have been four times and never had a bad bottle_**

 _20:06_

 _Hmm, maybe I'll have to try it sometime._

 ** _20:08_**

 ** _you know, i could just take you there on a date_**

 _20:09_

 _Okay._

 ** _20:09_**

 ** _yeah, that's what i figured – worth a shot though_**

 ** _20:11_**

 ** _wait WHAT_**

 ** _SERIOUSLY?_**

 _20:12_

 _Oh, so now you're capable of capitalization?_

 ** _20:15_**

 ** _capitalising letters takes too much work_**

 _20:17_

 _Wouldn't be a problem if you had an iPhone._

 _The green bubbles are annoying._

 ** _20:20_**

 ** _soz, i happen to be old-fashioned_**

Lily snorts at that. Old-fashioned, her ass. James, with his brash suggestiveness and pure recklessness, is very far from the old-fashioned gentlemen she read about in her uni literature classes.

 _20:25_

 _So, back to that date…_

 ** _20:29_**

 ** _wait, you're not joking? that's an actual yes?_**

 _20:30_

 _As long as you don't spend the whole time trying to get into my pants._

 ** _20:32_**

 **… _isn't that technically the point of a date?_**

 _20:33_

 _You know what I mean._

 _Keep the inappropriate comments to a minimum._

 _And I don't shag on the first date._

 ** _20:35_**

 ** _no promises, love_**

 _20:36_

 _I can rescind my yes at any time, you know._

 ** _20:37_**

 ** _no you can't_**

 ** _no take backsies_**

 _20:40_

 _We're not 3-year-olds, James. That rule died in nursery._

 ** _20:42_**

 ** _no take backsies is a motto i live my life upon_**

 _20:44_

 _I can't believe I agreed to go on a date with you._

When Lily accidentally lets it slip that she's going on a date with James on Saturday to Marlene and Dorcas, Marlene gives her a looks that screams 'I told you so,' and Dorcas is giddy about making sure Lily looks absolutely perfect.

Lily points out that she was wearing scrubs the first time they met, so if he was attracted to that, it probably doesn't matter what she looks like for this date anyways.

But Dorcas has always loved clothes and makeup, so Lily relents to Dorcas' pleas to help Lily get ready for the date.

On Saturday, two hours before James is set to pick her up, Dorcas comes flying into Lily's flat, cosmetics bag in hand and eyes aglow.

"You're wearing that dark green V-neck shirt you've got hanging in your closet – I know you hate green because you think it clashes with your hair, but it makes your eyes pop and your boobs look great, so it's worth it," Dorcas commands.

Lily accepts that, but not without a little grumbling about looking like 'bloody Christmas.' But Dorcas is right, as she usually is with all things fashion-related, and even Lily has to admit that she looks nothing short of stunning in that shirt, paired with a black skirt and over-the-knee boots.

Lily goes to grab a tube of dark lipstick, but Dorcas smacks it out of her hand. "You're going to leave dark red stains all over his face if you wear that."

"Who says I'm going to kiss him?" Lily retorts, even though she knows full well that there's a _very good_ chance that she kisses him. Provided he doesn't act like a total ass this time.

"The fact that you two have had sexual tension brewing over text message for the past month says that," Dorcas replies in a matter-of-fact tone.

Lily wouldn't quite call their conversations about Netflix binge-watching films of choice a 'sexual tension builder,' but she bites her tongue.

Eventually, once Lily is fully primped, Dorcas leaves. Lily sits on her couch, mindlessly scrolling through Instagram and Twitter to distract herself.

And then the doorbell rings, and Lily opens the door to reveal James, lounging against the door frame in a way she's sure he thinks is suave.

If Lily thought the bloke looked good in a rugby uniform, that's nothing compared to the complete _unfairness_ that is how attractive James Potter looks right now. He's dressed in dark jeans that are fitted just right, and a dark grey button down that's rolled up to his elbows.

When she looks up at his face, she notices that his lips are slightly parted and his eyes wide.

"What are you looking like that for?" she asks, suddenly a bit self-conscious.

He runs a hand through his hair. "We've just been communicating via text for so long that I almost forgot how pretty you are."

Lily rolls her eyes. "James, what did I say about the inappropriate comments?"

"That wasn't even remotely inappropriate – and that was genuine."

An uninvited flush creeps up Lily's cheeks – dammit, how did this boy go from being the most infuriating person she's ever met to this?

Although he can still be pretty infuriating, she has to admit.

"You're annoying," she finally gets out, but it's more teasing than malice.

He grins, clearly enjoying her slight discomfort. "And arrogant and reckless, I know. But the car's waiting downstairs, so if you'd like to continue to insult me you'll have to do it on the way to dinner."

And Lily laughs, locking the door to her flat and taking James' hand.

For that, she earns a look of shock, and she's suddenly immensely entertained by the fact that the same man who can breathe out suggestive comments like they're carbon dioxide can be so stunned by something as innocent as her holding his hand.

He's got a sleek black car waiting out front, and Lily's baffled by this level of luxury until she remembers that he's a professional athlete making an enormous sum of money, and that hiring a driver for the evening is probably something totally normal for him.

When they get to the restaurant, they're immediately directed to a private booth near the back. James clearly pulled some strings beforehand – Lily has to admit, it's a bit uncomfortable to reconcile the celebrity part of James with the part that she's come to know.

He really is a confounding bloke.

James apparently senses her mood shift. "Alright, Lily?"

She looks up from the menu, watching as James ruffles up his hair for what has to be the twentieth time tonight.

"I'm fine," she replies, and in truth, she really is fine. "I'd just forgotten that you're a bit of a, er, celebrity."

She expects this to result in some sort of egotistical comment, but instead James just laughs. "Yeah, I tend to forget it too. I mean, I'm just a bloke who runs around a field with a ball, and somehow I get to do it as a career."

Lily feels the tension in her shoulders loosen. "How'd you get into rugby, anyways?" she asks, suddenly curious. He'd asked her over text why she chose a medical career, but she hadn't asked him the same.

"My parents sent me to some fancy private school up north, and it was basically _the_ sport there. And I took to it like a house on fire. Next thing I know, I'm playing at uni and being scouted for a professional team."

"You went to uni?"

"Don't sound so surprised, Lily, geez," James replies with a smirk, before looking at the waiter that just appeared and ordering a bottle of Malbec for the two of them. Lily would normally be a bit annoyed that he'd ordered for her, but the conversation that led to this date _was_ about the wine at this restaurant, so she lets it go.

When the waiter walks away, James turns back to Lily. "But yeah, I went to King's College. Studied history – if I didn't end up getting scouted I was going to work for one of the museum's here in London. Had an internship lined up and everything."

That news surprises Lily. She also realises that she can _never_ share this information with Marlene, because dammit, that woman was right about yet another thing. James is not, in fact, just an airheaded athlete.

"And here I thought you were all brawn and no brains," Lily teases him.

"So you're admitting that you think I'm fit?"

"If I say yes, I'm worried that your ego might overinflate so much that you just float away."

James' bark of laughter is interrupted by the reappearance of their waiter, who pours James a sample of the bottle of wine that he just brought out. Like the posh bloke that he is, he swirls the wine in his glass before taking a sip.

"That's good," James tells him, and so the waiter fills Lily's glass as well before topping off James'.

Lily takes a sip, and _ugh_ , James is right. This is _fantastic_ wine. In her moment of pleasure, an entirely inappropriate noise escapes her lips.

She's fully expecting James to comment on it – given the almost-moaning sound she just made, it's the perfect set-up for one of his remarks. But instead, he just smirks at her, looking like he's got a comment on the tip of his tongue.

Lily surprises even herself by trying to tease it out of him. "Go on, say whatever it is you're thinking about saying."

"I was told 'no inappropriate comments,' so I'm doing my best to keep them to myself."

"What do you know," Lily muses in response, "an old dog is capable of learning new tricks."

James gives her a look. "We're the same age, love. Don't go calling me old."

She laughs.

"And also, that whole 'you can't teach an old dog new tricks' saying is totally wrong anyways. My mates have this huge 8-year-old lab, and I managed to teach it to play dead a few weeks ago."

"That's Sirius' dog, right?" Lily thinks of the oversized black dog that she met a few times when Sirius brought it with him to visit Remus in Oxford.

"Yeah," James answers, then pauses, looking at Lily quizzically. "Wait, how do you know Sirius?"

"Remus and I were friends at Oxford," Lily answers.

"Damn," James replies, feigning a look of disappointment. "If I'd known that earlier I would've asked him to put in a good word for me – maybe it would've gotten you to say 'yes' to me a little earlier."

"I mean, really, he technically did that a few weeks ago of his own accord. I ran into him at Tesco, and once we discovered that the annoying soulmate I met during an A&E shift was the same person as his mate from secondary school, he told me to give you a shot."

James looks at her, eyebrows raised. "Shit, I guess I should thank him for that."

"He also told me that you wouldn't shut up about me."

At that, James' cheeks fill with color, and he runs his hand through his hair again. "Er, yeah, I guess I did talk about you a fair bit," he concedes. "In my defense, you're apparently my soulmate. I've been waiting to meet you for, like, seven years."

Lily takes a sip of her wine. "Likewise. And then you made a terrible first impression."

"Ah, but I got you on a date with me anyways."

"Might've happened a little faster if you hadn't been such an arse," Lily remarks, before changing the subject. "What are you ordering?"

James tells her that he's torn between two dishes, which are, incidentally, the same two dishes that caught Lily's eye as well. And so Lily relents to the idea that they be one of 'those couples' and order one of the dishes each and split them both.

"Why didn't you mention that you were moving to London until I said something about it?" Lily asks, suddenly remembering that she'd found out about James' relocation from Remus and subsequently a newspaper article about the Wasps' relocation to their original London stadium, and had to actually bring up the topic to James herself.

It seems to Lily as though James would've wanted to tell her immediately, given how adamantly he'd been asking her on dates. Being in the same city as someone you're dating does have the tendency to make a relationship a bit easier.

"I didn't want to come on too strong," James admits. "I mean, I didn't want it to sound like I was up and moving to the same city as you immediately after we met – it sounds kind of creepy, when you think about it. So I figured I'd wait and see if you came around, and then it could be more like a happy coincidence."

Lily laughs at that, a loud, full-bodied laugh that would no doubt garner annoyed glances from fellow diners were it not for the fact that she and James are so secluded.

"You were worried about coming on too strong?" she asks, as soon as she regains her composure. "I believe you told me you wanted me to take your shirt off approximately five minutes into our first meeting."

"Actually, I said I wanted you to ask me to take my shirt off," James corrects.

As if that makes it any better, Lily thinks to herself.

"I was also on a ridiculous amount of painkiller at the time, so you'll have to forgive me for my lack of a filter."

Lily raises her eyebrows at him. "And what's your excuse the rest of the time?"

"That you're so gorgeous I just can't help myself?"

Lily simultaneously wants to both smack him upside the head and snog the living daylights out of him.

The rest of dinner continues in much the same way – flirtatious banter and finding out new things about each other that somehow hadn't been discussed in their weeks of texting. When the bill is paid – James hands the waiter his card before Lily can even reach for her purse and volunteer to split the bill – they walk out into the streets.

"If you're up for dessert, there's a shop right below my flat that has the _best_ pastries – it's a five minute walk from here."

Lily finds that she wants this date to last as long as possible – as much as she hates to admit it, James has completely charmed her, arrogant comments and all.

"Let's go," she tells him, looking up at him and grinning.

His expression mirrors hers, and he wraps an arm around her shoulders as they start to walk. When she doesn't shrug him off, he slides his hand down to her waist.

"No lower," she warns him, but she wraps her arm around him as well.

At the tiny little Italian bakery, they split a cannoli and a chocolate tart and sit at one of the tables by the front window.

Lily gets a bit of mascarpone on her lip at one point, and James reaches over to wipe it off, his finger lingering just a second too long at the corner of her mouth. And Lily has no idea what comes over her, but she reacts by wrapping her mouth around James' fingertip and sucking the cannoli filling off of it.

She watches as James' irises dilate in response, and she has to firmly remind herself that she has a rule against sleeping with blokes on the first date.

But oh God, does she want to.

When the desserts are done, they walk outside. Lily pulls out her phone to call a ride home, and suddenly balks at the price. "Fuck surge pricing," she mutters.

"What?"

"It's like four times more expensive than usual to get home," she explains.

"I can call my driver from earlier," James offers, pulling out his phone.

"No, it's fine, really," Lily says. "I can see if it goes down in a – honestly James, what the hell kind of phone is that?"

Lily stares at the contraption in James' right hand, a silver flip phone that has to be at least eight years old.

"Don't judge my phone," he replies, a smirk on his face. "I happen to prefer the T-9 keyboard."

Lily actually laughs out loud at that. "James Potter, you might be the only person in the history of the world to _prefer_ a T-9 keyboard. Although, I guess that explains why you text so slow."

"I do not text slow!" he protests.

"Slower than someone with a smartphone."

"Well, while you and your fancy smartphone wait for a cheaper ride home, do you want to come up to my flat? It's a bit warmer than standing here on the sidewalk."

Lily's sensible side knows that going up to his flat comes with a high risk of… other things happening. But he _is_ right that it'll be warmer up there. So she agrees to it, and follows him through the building's fancy lobby and up to the penthouse.

When the lift door slides open, James' flat is nothing like what Lily would've expected it to look like. She pictures a rugby player's flat as something covered in sports memorabilia… something of a 'man cave,' really.

But instead, this place is decorated to the nines – all warm-toned painted walls and plush seating and… _deer_? Yes, James apparently seems to have a thing for deer, because they're on the patterns of the accent pillows, the decorative figurine on the coffee table, and the simple silhouette artwork on the walls.

"James? Why is your flat deer-themed?" The words are out of Lily's mouth before she can think of a more eloquent way to phrase them.

James doesn't look her in the eye. "I just like them, is all. We – me, Sirius, Remus, and our other friend Peter – had this conversation in secondary where we all chose our 'spirit animals,' and we decided mine was a stag. And I've kind of had a thing for them ever since."

Lily resists the urge to laugh, because she knows he's already a little embarrassed from her initial question, but she's struck by just how _different_ James is than what she expected when she first met him.

She walks across the room and ends up in front of the bookshelf. The books displayed are thick academic tomes: _The Development of Mass Communication in the Two World Wars, The Long-Term Impacts of British Imperialism,_ and _A Feminist Revision of British History_. As Lily reads the spines of his book collection, she can't help but giggle to herself.

"What are you laughing at?" James' voice is right behind her, and Lily almost jumps. She didn't realise he was quite so close.

She spins around and finds herself face-to-face with her date. Who, despite being a famous athlete and an admittedly incredibly attractive bloke, still owns a flip phone and decorates his flat based on his 'spirit animal' and maintains an impressive collection of niche history books. "It's just – you're such a _dork_."

James frowns, trying to piece together Lily's grin with what just came out of her mouth, that he's no doubt interpreting as an insult.

"I mean that in a good way," she clarifies. "I like you more for it."

And that's all she has to say for James' frown to be replaced by a cocky smirk. "Just how much more?"

"This much more." And Lily wraps her arms around his neck and pulls his face down to hers.

Their lips meet, and Lily immediately feels warmth flooding through her entire body. It's like nothing she's ever experienced before, and she eagerly threads her hands through his hair – it's just as fun to play with as she expected, she notes – and deepens the kiss.

James apparently feels likewise, one hand settling on her waist and the other on the back of her neck as he gently backs her up against the bookcase.

The kiss becomes an open-mouthed one, and Lily swears that she can literally see sparks fly behind her closed eyelids. She wonders if this is a side effect of the whole nerve-linkage thing, amplifying their physical connection. Although it's never showed up in any of the academic papers she's read about all this soulmate science.

Regardless of the science behind it, Lily _really_ wants to shag him. Sod her own rules, honestly. She reaches for the buttons on his shirt, undoing the first two before James pulls his lips from hers to give her a slightly startled look.

"Is this okay?" she asks tentatively.

"Fuck yes it is," he chokes out, and resumes kissing her with even more fervor than before.

They don't even make it to the bedroom.


	4. a final relationship

The first thing Lily sees when she wakes up is a pair of antlers. The shock of that is probably why it takes her longer than it should to remember where she fell asleep last night.

Lily knows she should probably regret her decision to stay the night, but she just… can't. Everything about last night – the dinner, the date, the _sex_ – was amazing.

It surprises her, how James is so different from what she'd expected her soulmate to be and yet he has her completely charmed nonetheless. For someone who thought she knew exactly what she wanted in all aspects of life, Lily is discovering that she actually may not have known everything.

The distinct scent of coffee pulls Lily from her morning thoughts, and it's only then that she realizes that the space in the bed next to her is empty. She gets out of James' bed and follows the smell, exiting the bedroom and finding the source of the fragrance in the form of a coffee machine on the kitchen counter.

James is standing in front of the stove, cooking what appears to be eggs and bacon. And he's doing so shirtless. God, did the man step straight of one of Marlene's trashy romance novels or something?

No, definitely not, Lily realizes. If he were something out of a romance novel, he wouldn't have just let out an aggressive stream of swear words in response to getting hit with a spatter of hot grease.

Lily laughs at that, even though her own finger is smarting from the spot where James just got burnt, and her laugh serves to alert James of her presence. He jumps a little, but by the time he turns around to look at her, he's got a smirk pasted on his face.

"Between the two of us, we successfully make up one fully-clothed person."

Given that Lily is clad in nothing but one of James' old uni T-shirts, James does have a point. It is, however, an incredibly odd way to greet her, Lily thinks to herself.

"Good morning to you too," she answers.

"I'm making breakfast," James adds, as if the fact that he's standing in front of the stove doesn't make that fact incredibly obvious.

"Yes, and you're going to burn it if you keep watching me instead of the food."

"Oh shit." James turns his attention back to his cooking – nothing is actually burnt, but Lily finds that she rather enjoys teasing him for the hell of it.

As Lily sits on one of James' barstools, it strikes her that this 'morning after' stuff seems to be something that James is all-too-familiar with. She's never had a one night stand, or even slept with a bloke on the first date. But James, famous rugby player that he is – Lily can't help but wonder how many other girls have sat in this same position before her.

Instantly, she's struck with a wave of insecurity – that same fear that kept her from agreeing to a date in the first place, that fear that she was nothing more than a game to be won.

And she had certainly let James win that game. The fact that she's sitting in his kitchen the morning after, wearing nothing but his T-shirt, with the vivid memory of just how many times she had cried out his name last night, is evidence of that.

"So," James begins, placing a loaded plate in front of Lily, "Sirius and Remus are throwing some sort of full moon bash at their flat next Friday. Want to come with?"

As James slides into the seat next to her, Lily feels the tension in her shoulders fade away as quickly as it came. If James is already inviting her to come hang out with his friends, this doesn't seem like a one-time thing after all.

"We're not even done with the first date and you're already asking me on a second one," Lily replies, using a bite of egg to conceal the smile creeping up her face.

"Yes, but this isn't any old first date, love," James replies easily. "This is my first date with my _soulmate_. And in all likelihood, my last first date."

He smirks at her, and even though it's that same casual confidence that once endlessly ground on Lily's nerves, it now has the effect of completely melting her heart into a puddle.

After they finish eating, Lily changes back into her clothes from the night before and kisses him as she leaves. That's the right thing to do when leaving a bloke's apartment in the morning, right? Lily isn't really sure of the protocol for this sort of thing.

Then again, she's quite sure that they've completely buggered up the protocol in endless other ways.

Lily has the vainest of hopes that she won't run into either of her friends on the way up to her flat, but as fate would have it, Marlene steps off the lift with her dog Benjy as soon as Lily walks into the lobby.

Marlene takes one look at her friend, and her face splits into a massive grin.

"Oh we are most definitely talking about this later," Marlene teases as she walks by.

Lily's cheeks burn in response. She's distracted from her embarrassment, however, by a buzzing in her pocket.

 ** _11:23_**

 ** _admit it: you fancy me_**

Lily laughs to herself as she steps on the lift.

 _11:25_

 _Just how long did it take you to find a colon on that T9 keyboard of yours?_

 ** _11:26_**

 ** _irrelevant_**

 ** _i'm waiting on a confession here_**

 _11:27_

 _I feel like my actions from last night and this morning should be a sufficient answer._

 ** _11:28_**

 ** _but i wanna hear the words from you_**

 ** _i need evidence that i did eventually woo the unwooable lily evans_**

 _11:29_

 _I am 110% sure that "unwooable" is not a word._

 _But fine._

 _Yes, I fancy you._

 ** _11:31_**

 ** _ha! i knew it!_**

 _11:32_

 _You fancied me first, you idiot._

 ** _11:33_**

 ** _betcha wouldn't rather go on a date with the loch ness monster now, eh?_**

 _11:35_

 _You have a point._

 _It's an even tie now._

Lily opens the door to her flat, laughing when James' outraged response pops up on her phone screen. She knows Marlene will come knocking soon looking for details, and Dorcas will follow soon after, and more and more people will eventually find out.

For now, Lily sits on her couch, reminiscing on the best details of the previous night – the ones not significant enough to share with anyone else but the ones she treasures the most: how James stood in her doorway trying to look cool when he picked her up, him adamantly defending his ancient flip phone, the way that he kissed her just before they fell asleep.

* * *

Unsurprisingly, it takes all of 48 hours for someone in the Saint Bartholomew's A&E department to find out about Lily's new relationship.

She catches on when she walks into the hospital cafeteria on Monday and instantly notices that a number of the interns surreptitiously glance her way. She tries not to think much of it, but that plan of action is ruined when one of the interns, Alice Prewett, walks up to the table that Lily is sitting at with Marlene.

It's obvious that the interns had a strategy to this; it's well-known that Lily considers Alice to be one of the best interns in their year.

"Lily – er, Doctor Evans," Alice starts, looking a bit nervous about being the one put up to this, "is it true that you're dating a famous rugby player?"

"We went on _a_ date," Lily corrects.

"And they're going to get married and have the most intelligent and athletic children ever," Marlene oh-so-helpfully adds in.

Lily rolls her eyes before looking back at the intern. "Where did you get that information anyways?"

"Oh, Frank follows a Wasps fan account, and they tweeted a picture of the two of you walking out of a restaurant. We all thought it was you, but we couldn't be sure. Hence, why I got sent over to ask you."

Lily nods. "Well yes, it was me."

A bit of relief floods across Alice's face when she notices that Lily isn't getting annoyed at the confrontation. "Right, well, thanks."

"Although I'd really prefer it if you lot didn't discuss my love life, if that's quite alright," Lily quips, grinning conspiratorially. "You stay hush about mine, and I won't tell the entire hospital that you and Frank were shagging in the break room last week."

Alice's cheeks flush bright pink. "I – I will do my best to change the subject."

"And tell Doctor Abbott that I've got my eye on him." Lily knows that the intern in question knows quite a bit of information about Lily's first meeting with James, and she'd prefer if that information _didn't_ spread around the hospital.

"Will do, Lily."

As soon as Alice turns around to head back to the intern table, Marlene starts laughing. "Do you always have to be so cruel to the interns?"

Lily shrugs. "I'm not cruel. I just enjoy having a little bit of power over them, is all. I'm nowhere near as bad as my own internship supervisor was."

"And you got that bloke fired."

"Yes, well, Doctor Snape got fired for unprofessional behavior. None of my behavior was unprofessional," Lily answers.

"Lily, you just basically blackmailed an intern into not talking about your love life."

Lily laughs. "It's Alice. She knows I'm joking. I've been ribbing her about the Frank stuff ever since I found out she fancied him."

"Oh, well they're cute together," Marlene says, looking over at the intern table. "Good for them."

And then after a moment, she adds, "Should I go over to the intern table and regale them with the story of you not making it back from your date until Sunday morning?"

Lily swats her friend's arm. "You wouldn't dare."

* * *

On the night of Remus and Sirius' party, Lily opens the door to her flat to reveal James leaning against her doorway in much the same manner as he did on the night of their first date.

"I can't believe you think that makes you look cool," Lily says by way of greeting.

James raises an eyebrow. "Are you saying it doesn't?"

Lily laughs. "No, it makes you look like you're trying too hard."

"Well, that too, I suppose," James admits.

Lily realizes how much she likes that James can take her teasing in stride – something none of her past boyfriends were particularly good at. She's always had a sarcastic side, and it has more often than not caused some sort of offence in previous relationships.

As James is holding the door open to the same private car he showed up with last time, he pops the relationship-defining question. "So, what are we?"

Lily's not quite sure what he means, so she asks for clarification.

"I mean," James answers, "how do I introduce you to my friends? Are you 'Lily, my girlfriend'? Or is that too fast? Should we go with 'Lily, the girl that I went on a date with and shagged that one time'?"

Lily shoves him when he slides into the seat next to her. "That second option is a hard _no_. Which, I suppose means the first option is the only one we've got."

Lily knows they're probably moving a little too fast – or, at least, they're moving faster than any of Lily's past relationships. But this isn't a past relationship. This is James. This is her _soulmate_ , even if she's still a little uncertain about the accuracy of the match.

The old rules no longer apply.

James flashes a megawatt smile in her direction. "Brilliant. Doctor Lily Evans, my wonderful and incredibly sexy girlfriend."

" 'My girlfriend' will suffice," Lily replies with a roll of her eyes.

"I can work with that," James answers, leaning over to kiss her.

And that kiss turns into a heated snogging session that lasts the duration of the ride to Remus and Sirius' place. Lily has to strategically position her hair to conceal the two marks James made on her neck.

When they walk into the flat, James is immediately accosted by a huge black dog. "Padfoot, buddy!" he cries, dropping to his knees to greet the dog affectionately. "It's been too long!"

"You say that like you didn't live on our couch until like three weeks ago," Remus says, having joined his dog at the doorway to greet James and Lily.

"And that was three weeks too long," James reasons.

"James! It's been way too long!" Sirius suddenly pops into the conversation, immediately giving James a hug and clapping him on the back.

Lily and Remus share a glance, silently communicating something along the lines of 'why are our boyfriends like this?'

This is the first time Lily has called James her boyfriend, even if only in nonverbal communication. She finds that she's fond of the new title.

James suddenly jumps up to his full height again. "Right, so this is Lily, my girlfriend," he announces, wrapping an arm around Lily's waist as if to provide a visual demonstration to accompany his words.

Remus laughs. "James, you know Lily has already met both Sirius and I, right?"

"He knows that," Sirius chimes in. "He just wanted an excuse to announce that he's somehow nailed down the girl that once told him she'd rather live off Marmite than go on a date with him."

James and Lily both blush simultaneously – James for being called out on his overeagerness to announce his newly-defined relationship and Lily for being treated with the memory of one of her many creative rejections of her now-boyfriend.

"The all-Marmite diet is going swimmingly, thanks for asking," Lily replies, trying her best to hold back a grin.

"Anyways," Remus says, changing the subject, "can I get you two something to drink?"

Lily answers with "whiskey and Diet Coke, please," at the same time as James replies, "whiskey and Coke, obviously."

Somehow Remus catches both of those orders, and walks through the clusters of people to the makeshift bar in the living room. Meanwhile, James pulls his hand off of Lily's waist, and Lily looks up at him to realise he's looking at her, nose crinkled in disgust.

"I can't believe you'd _destroy_ perfectly good whiskey with that disgusting fake sugar stuff," James tells her, sounding scandalised.

"And I can't believe you'd drink something that's basically 100% sugar," Lily retorts. She doesn't even care that much, but she feels obligated to reciprocate James' intensity.

"You know, when Remus first told me that you two were apparently soulmates, I didn't think that match made much sense," Sirius comments, watching the two of them. "But holy fuck, you two are perfect for each other. No two normal people would get this intense about mixer choices."

James laughs, and any tension, real or dramatised – although Lily's pretty sure it was the latter – floats away. He grabs Lily's hand and drags her along to meet a bunch of his friends.

The Friday night party ends up being a catalyst for an entire weekend that James and Lily spend side-by-side. The pattern continues for nearly every weekend following, with the exception of when James' coach schedules a weekend practice.

Lily has some reservations about the relationship moving as fast as it is, but those reservations get completely washed away every time James says or does something ridiculous that makes her fall for him even more.

When rugby season starts again, she starts going to his games whenever she can. She wears a bright yellow jersey with "Potter" across the back, because it makes James happy even though the color clashes horrendously with her hair. By some miracle, he tends to get injured less when she's there watching, although he does get hit in the jaw one time while Lily is in the middle of eating chips, and she's not too happy about that one.

She's not entirely sure what the catalyst is, but Lily and James have been together for about two months when she realizes that she's in love with him.

Lily reminds herself that, objectively, love is simply a combination of brain chemicals designed to create attraction and attachment. Looking at it that way, she feels more justified; if the sequence of actions in her and James' relationship just happens to be creating those chemical reactions at a faster rate than normal, who is she to suggest they slow down?

Eventually, she's the one that says it first, in the middle of a rainy day Netflix marathon of obscure documentaries. James pauses the film, going into a brief rant about how the narrator is only considering one perspective in his analysis of the War of the Roses – something that is apparently _incredibly_ problematic.

Lily turns her head to look at her boyfriend, who's far too fired up about a documentary narrator's script, and says 'I love you' before she can think about it.

It takes James a moment to react – he drops the remote off the couch and has to fumble to pick it up. When he does, he's practically glowing.

"I love you so fucking much," is James' eventual reply.

And the Victorian documentary is entirely forgotten as James leans over to kiss her, and it quickly becomes the second time they've shagged in his living room.

They lay there on his couch afterwards, all wrapped up in each other and blissfully happy about it.

Perhaps she had this whole soulmate thing wrong before, Lily muses. She'd always envisioned a 'soulmate' as someone with an identical soul – like Marlene and Dorcas, who are so similar they finish each other's sentences and come up with the same ideas simultaneously.

And while that may be one type of soulmate, Lily has found that she and James fit together in a different sort of way. They are two totally different people, two opposite souls, but they somehow combine to make something better, stronger.

Their personalities are cacophonous – Lily is everything that James is not, and vice versa. But they balance each other out. James eases out Lily's sense of spontaneity, and Lily drives James to think through the consequences of his actions before charging blindly at an issue (or an opposing rugby player).

They catch themselves in petty arguments regularly. For all their differences, they're united in their stubbornness and self-assurance. But they work through it. Lily lives for a challenge – perhaps that's why James is her soulmate, honestly – so she takes their disputes in stride, and they work together to solve their problems. They make it through each time.

* * *

As yet another development in the theme of their relationship moving light years faster than anything Lily would've normally anticipated, they've only been together for ten months when James gets down on one knee.

It's after a rugby match, but James seems to know Lily well enough to know that she would've hated a public proposal. So he waits until everyone's left the stadium, and he proposes in the same spot that he broke two ribs just a year before.

Lily stares at her boyfriend of less than a year, reminded once again just how much he's thrown her entire existence for a loop. Before, she would never have even vaguely considered marrying someone she'd met only a year ago; now, she looks at James and can't imagine anything else, can't imagine any timing more perfect than this.

So her answer is a resounding yes, _yes_ , YES. As she leans down to kiss her new fiancé and he slides a ring onto her finger, her friends and family – sans Petunia – come pouring out from their hiding spots behind the stands.

Sirius reaches them first. "Look at our Jamesy-boy, all grown up!" he cries, throwing an arm around James as soon as he and Lily break apart.

He suddenly turns his attention to Lily. "Did he tell you how long he's had that ring for?"

James shoves Sirius, but that doesn't seem to be enough of a deterrent for James' childhood friend. "He bought it the day after he met you."

Lily looks at James, trying to stifle a laugh. "You did realise I pretty much hated you that day, right?"

She thinks back to that day in room A220, snapping at Daniel Abbott and losing her temper with James. If someone were to tell her a year ago that she'd be engaged to that same infuriating patient a year later, she would've called them insane.

James smirks. "I knew I'd wear you down eventually," he answers.

"The one time that your recklessness actually turned out in your favor," she replies, admiring the diamond ring adorning her left hand.

"I'll have to be reckless a lot more often, then."

"I think you've achieved enough recklessness to last a lifetime, love," Lily says, closing the gap between her and James and kissing him yet again, prompting a number of whoops and a wolf-whistle from Marlene.

In addition to the ring, James celebrates their engagement in the form of a piece of artwork: a silhouette of a doe that joins James' stag on the wall of his – now _their_ – flat. The two creatures hang side-by-side, facing each other as if being together is their destiny. Not unlike the two people those deer are meant to represent.

Lily can't think of anything more perfect.


End file.
